| Oakland Ballers | |||||
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| Class | Independent | ||||
| League | Pioneer League | ||||
| Team data | |||||
| Name | Oakland B's | ||||
| Colors | Green, gold, gray | ||||
| Ballpark | Raimondi Field (4,000) | ||||
Owner(s)/ Operator(s) | Oakland 68s (Bryan Carmel & Paul Freedman, Founders) | ||||
| Manager | Micah Franklin | ||||
The Oakland Ballers, nicknamed the Oakland B's, are an independent baseball team that will play in the Pioneer League in 2024.
The team was created following the approval of the Oakland Athletics' relocation to Las Vegas by MLB team owners. The non-profit Oakland 68's raised more than $2 million to establish the team [1] and was inspired by the success of Oakland Roots SC soccer team. [2] The press release for the team's announcement included a pledge for fan ownership based around a 2024 crowdfunding campaign. [3] Don Wakamatsu was appointed as the team's first-ever executive vice president of baseball operations. [4] The first player signed to the team was Dondrei Hubbard, announced on December 10, 2023. [5]
They will be located in Oakland, California and initially planned to play their home games at Laney College, [6] with an expansion of the park's facilities to hold upwards of 2,500 fans. [7] [8] A proposed game at the Oakland Coliseum was blocked by the Oakland Athletics. [9] In February 2024 it was announced that they would instead play their home games at Raimondi Field in West Oakland. [10]
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The Oakland Athletics are an American professional baseball team based in Oakland, California. The Athletics compete in Major League Baseball (MLB) as a member club of the American League (AL) West Division. The team currently plays its home games at the Oakland Coliseum, with plans to temporarily move to Sutter Health Park in West Sacramento, California, for the 2025–2027 seasons, prior to their permanent move to Las Vegas. The nine World Series championships, fifteen pennants, and seventeen division titles that the A's have won throughout their history is the second-highest in the American League after the New York Yankees.
In sports analytics, sabermetrics is the empirical analysis of baseball, especially baseball statistics that measure in-game activity. Sabermetricians collect and summarize the relevant data from this in-game activity to answer specific questions. The term is derived from the acronym SABR, which stands for the Society for American Baseball Research, founded in 1971. The term "sabermetrics" was coined by Bill James, who is one of its pioneers and is often considered its most prominent advocate and public face.
Major League Baseball (MLB) is a professional baseball league and the highest level of organized baseball in the United States and Canada. One of the big four major leagues, MLB comprises 30 teams, divided equally between the National League (NL) and the American League (AL), with 29 in the United States and 1 in Canada. Formed in 1876 and 1901, respectively, the NL and AL cemented their cooperation with the National Agreement in 1903, making MLB the oldest major professional sports league in the world. They remained legally separate entities until 2000, when they merged into a single organization led by the Commissioner of Baseball. MLB is headquartered in Midtown Manhattan.
The Pioneer Baseball League is a professional baseball league based in the Western United States. It operates as one of four Major League Baseball (MLB) Partner Leagues in the American independent baseball league system without MLB team affiliations. The league is contested by twelve teams from the Northern California and Rocky Mountains regions, who play a regular season split into two halves. The top two teams at the end of each half qualify for a postseason tournament that determines the overall champion.
Oakland–Alameda County Coliseum is a multi-purpose stadium in Oakland, California, United States. It is part of the Oakland–Alameda County Coliseum Complex, with the adjacent Oakland Arena, near Interstate 880. In 2017, the playing surface was dedicated as Rickey Henderson Field in honor of Major League Baseball Hall of Famer and former Athletics left fielder Rickey Henderson.
The Bay Bridge Series, or the Battle of the Bay, is a series of baseball games played between—and the rivalry of—Major League Baseball's Oakland Athletics of the American League and San Francisco Giants of the National League. The series takes its name from the San Francisco–Oakland Bay Bridge which links the cities of Oakland and San Francisco. As of 2018, the winner of the annual series retains a trophy fashioned from a piece of the original bridge.
Elvis Augusto Andrus Torres is a Venezuelan-American professional baseball shortstop who is a free agent. He has previously played in Major League Baseball (MLB) for the Texas Rangers, Oakland Athletics, and Chicago White Sox. He is a two-time All-Star.
Howard Terminal Ballpark was a proposed baseball stadium to be built in the Jack London Square neighborhood of Oakland, California. If approved and constructed, it would have served as the new home stadium of the Oakland Athletics of Major League Baseball, replacing the Oakland Coliseum. The 34,000-seat stadium was the last of several proposals to keep the Athletics in Oakland. The site is currently a parcel of land owned by the Port of Oakland. After securing the site, the Athletics planned to have the stadium built and operational after the team's lease expired at the Oakland Coliseum in 2024.
William Alex North is an American former center fielder in Major League Baseball. From 1971 to 1981, he played for the Chicago Cubs (1971–72), Oakland Athletics (1973–78), Los Angeles Dodgers (1978) and San Francisco Giants (1979–81). He was a switch hitter and threw right-handed.
Mount Davis, or Mt. Davis, is a section of 20,000 capacity seating at the Oakland Coliseum in Oakland, California, United States. It was built in 1995 at the behest of Oakland City Council with the intent of bringing the Los Angeles Raiders American football team back to Oakland and is named after former Oakland Raiders owner Al Davis. Since 2006, the top-tier seating of Mount Davis has been covered by tarpaulin during all Oakland Athletics baseball games, and the Oakland Raiders followed suit in 2013.
Wilbur Donald Wakamatsu is an American former professional baseball player, scout, coach, and manager. Wakamatsu was drafted in the 11th round of the 1985 Major League Baseball draft by the Cincinnati Reds. He played as a catcher in Major League Baseball for the Chicago White Sox. He served as the bench coach of the Texas Rangers from 2018 through 2021. He was hired as bench coach of the Kansas City Royals for the 2014 season. He was the manager of the Seattle Mariners for the 2009 season, as well as the majority of the 2010 season. He was the Toronto Blue Jays' bench coach for 2011 and 2012, after which he was replaced by DeMarlo Hale. During the 2013 season he worked as a scout for the New York Yankees in the Dallas/Fort Worth area. He is currently the first-ever executive vice president of baseball operations with the Oakland Ballers.
The Oakland Athletics' 1987 season involved the A's finishing third in the American League West with a record of 81 wins and 81 losses. Mark McGwire set a rookie record by hitting 49 home runs. At the beginning of the season, the word "Athletics" returned, in script lettering, to the front of the team's jerseys. Former A's owner, Charles O. Finley banned the word "Athletics" from the club's name in the past because he felt that name was too closely associated with former Philadelphia Athletics owner Connie Mack. In his first full Major League season, Mark McGwire hit 49 home runs, a single-season record for a rookie; he was named the American League Rookie of the Year. McGwire would be the first American League rookie since Al Rosen of the Cleveland Indians in 1950 to lead the American League in home runs. The 1987 season also saw the return of Reggie Jackson to Oakland.
The San Francisco Bay Area, which includes the major cities of San Francisco, Oakland, and San Jose, hosts six major league sports franchises, with a major women's sports franchise soon to start play, as well as several other professional and college sports teams, and hosts other sports events.
The history of the Athletics Major League Baseball franchise spans the period from 1901 to the present day, having begun as a charter member franchise in the new American League in Philadelphia before moving to Kansas City in 1955 for 13 seasons and then to the San Francisco Bay in Oakland, California, in 1968. The team endured numerous attendance issues stemming from the aging Oakland Coliseum before the MLB owners approved the team's application to relocate to Las Vegas, Nevada in 2023.
Robert Dean Manfred Jr. is an American lawyer and business executive who is serving as the tenth commissioner of Major League Baseball. He previously served as MLB's chief operating officer. Manfred succeeded Bud Selig as commissioner on January 25, 2015.
Matthew James Chapman is an American professional baseball third baseman for the San Francisco Giants of Major League Baseball (MLB). He has previously played in MLB for the Oakland Athletics and Toronto Blue Jays.
Matthew Kent Olson is an American professional baseball first baseman for the Atlanta Braves of Major League Baseball (MLB). He has previously played in MLB for the Oakland Athletics.
David A. Kaval is an American sports executive. He is the seventh president of the Oakland Athletics of Major League Baseball. He previously served as president of Major League Soccer club San Jose Earthquakes and founded the Golden Baseball League.
The Oakland Athletics relocation to Las Vegas is an ongoing effort by ownership of the Oakland Athletics of Major League Baseball (MLB) to relocate the franchise from Oakland, California to Las Vegas, Nevada. The team has been based in Oakland since 1968, where it has won four World Series titles. Their relocation would make them the second major sports franchise to move from Oakland to Las Vegas, following the Oakland Raiders of the National Football League (NFL) making the same move in 2020.
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